Measure for Measure

Angelo. When I would pray and think, I think and pray
To several subjects. Heaven hath my empty words;
Whilst my invention, hearing not my tongue,
Anchors on Isabel: Heaven in my mouth,
1020As if I did but only chew his name;
And in my heart the strong and swelling evil
Of my conception. The state, whereon I studied
Is like a good thing, being often read,
Grown fear'd and tedious; yea, my gravity,
1025Wherein—let no man hear me—I take pride,
Could I with boot change for an idle plume,
Which the air beats for vain. O place, O form,
How often dost thou with thy case, thy habit,
Wrench awe from fools and tie the wiser souls
1030To thy false seeming! Blood, thou art blood:
Let's write good angel on the devil's horn:
'Tis not the devil's crest.
[Enter a Servant]How now! who's there?
1035

Angelo. Teach her the way.
[Exit Servant]O heavens!
Why does my blood thus muster to my heart,
1040Making both it unable for itself,
And dispossessing all my other parts
Of necessary fitness?
So play the foolish throngs with one that swoons;
Come all to help him, and so stop the air
1045By which he should revive: and even so
The general, subject to a well-wish'd king,
Quit their own part, and in obsequious fondness
Crowd to his presence, where their untaught love
Must needs appear offence.
1050[Enter ISABELLA]How now, fair maid?

Isabella. When, I beseech you? that in his reprieve,
Longer or shorter, he may be so fitted
That his soul sicken not.

Angelo. Ha! fie, these filthy vices! It were as good
To pardon him that hath from nature stolen
1065A man already made, as to remit
Their saucy sweetness that do coin heaven's image
In stamps that are forbid: 'tis all as easy
Falsely to take away a life true made
As to put metal in restrained means
1070To make a false one.

Angelo. Say you so? then I shall pose you quickly.
Which had you rather, that the most just law
Now took your brother's life; or, to redeem him,
1075Give up your body to such sweet uncleanness
As she that he hath stain'd?

Angelo. Nay, I'll not warrant that; for I can speak
Against the thing I say. Answer to this:
I, now the voice of the recorded law,
1085Pronounce a sentence on your brother's life:
Might there not be a charity in sin
To save this brother's life?

Isabella. Please you to do't,
I'll take it as a peril to my soul,
1090It is no sin at all, but charity.

Angelo. Pleased you to do't at peril of your soul,
Were equal poise of sin and charity.

Isabella. That I do beg his life, if it be sin,
Heaven let me bear it! you granting of my suit,
1095If that be sin, I'll make it my morn prayer
To have it added to the faults of mine,
And nothing of your answer.

Angelo. Nay, but hear me.
Your sense pursues not mine: either you are ignorant,
1100Or seem so craftily; and that's not good.

Isabella. Let me be ignorant, and in nothing good,
But graciously to know I am no better.

Angelo. Thus wisdom wishes to appear most bright
When it doth tax itself; as these black masks
1105Proclaim an enshield beauty ten times louder
Than beauty could, display'd. But mark me;
To be received plain, I'll speak more gross:
Your brother is to die.

Angelo. Admit no other way to save his life,—
As I subscribe not that, nor any other,
1115But in the loss of question,—that you, his sister,
Finding yourself desired of such a person,
Whose credit with the judge, or own great place,
Could fetch your brother from the manacles
Of the all-building law; and that there were
1120No earthly mean to save him, but that either
You must lay down the treasures of your body
To this supposed, or else to let him suffer;
What would you do?

Isabella. As much for my poor brother as myself:
1125That is, were I under the terms of death,
The impression of keen whips I'ld wear as rubies,
And strip myself to death, as to a bed
That longing have been sick for, ere I'ld yield
My body up to shame.
1130

Isabella. Ay, as the glasses where they view themselves;
Which are as easy broke as they make forms.
Women! Help Heaven! men their creation mar
1155In profiting by them. Nay, call us ten times frail;
For we are soft as our complexions are,
And credulous to false prints.

Angelo. I think it well:
And from this testimony of your own sex,—
1160Since I suppose we are made to be no stronger
Than faults may shake our frames,—let me be bold;
I do arrest your words. Be that you are,
That is, a woman; if you be more, you're none;
If you be one, as you are well express'd
1165By all external warrants, show it now,
By putting on the destined livery.

Isabella. I have no tongue but one: gentle my lord,
Let me entreat you speak the former language.

Isabella. Ha! little honour to be much believed,
And most pernicious purpose! Seeming, seeming!
1180I will proclaim thee, Angelo; look for't:
Sign me a present pardon for my brother,
Or with an outstretch'd throat I'll tell the world aloud
What man thou art.

Angelo. Who will believe thee, Isabel?
1185My unsoil'd name, the austereness of my life,
My vouch against you, and my place i' the state,
Will so your accusation overweigh,
That you shall stifle in your own report
And smell of calumny. I have begun,
1190And now I give my sensual race the rein:
Fit thy consent to my sharp appetite;
Lay by all nicety and prolixious blushes,
That banish what they sue for; redeem thy brother
By yielding up thy body to my will;
1195Or else he must not only die the death,
But thy unkindness shall his death draw out
To lingering sufferance. Answer me to-morrow,
Or, by the affection that now guides me most,
I'll prove a tyrant to him. As for you,
1200Say what you can, my false o'erweighs your true.

[Exit]

Isabella. To whom should I complain? Did I tell this,
Who would believe me? O perilous mouths,
That bear in them one and the self-same tongue,
1205Either of condemnation or approof;
Bidding the law make court'sy to their will:
Hooking both right and wrong to the appetite,
To follow as it draws! I'll to my brother:
Though he hath fallen by prompture of the blood,
1210Yet hath he in him such a mind of honour.
That, had he twenty heads to tender down
On twenty bloody blocks, he'ld yield them up,
Before his sister should her body stoop
To such abhorr'd pollution.
1215Then, Isabel, live chaste, and, brother, die:
More than our brother is our chastity.
I'll tell him yet of Angelo's request,
And fit his mind to death, for his soul's rest.